Friday, September 23, 2005

Pick any group. Eventually, you will be able to find a set of events that will allow you to say "God is punishing that group and those who tolerate members of that group living amongst us." These types of arguments are the wares of the hate-monger; the individual who is in the market to sell hate and fear.

It should be obvious by now. America has offended Allah with its Crusade against Islam, and Allah is striking at us in order to defend His chosen people. Hurricane Rita is simply the most recent in a long list of messages that Allah has sent telling us that He sides against us with Muslim fundamentalists.

It 's more than just these two hurricanes that prove that this is the case. Last year, Florida got hit by 4 hurricanes; one of which turned around and came back, hitting Florida twice. Who else but Allah could stop a hurricane in its tracks and send it back to strike Florida a second time? No force of nature can do that.

The odds against America suffering so many strikes -- the last two against vital strategic targets that Muslim fundamenalists would have targeted -- are so astronomically low that there must be an intelligent design behind it.

Obviously, the reason that Allah is attacking Florida is because its governor is George Bush's brother. Allah wanted to make his message clear, so He sent all of His hurricanes against this one state.

Katrina and Rita also hit Florida, though Allah clearly had grown impatient and sought other useful targets as well. So, He aimed the hurricanes at New Orleans to destroy the city more efficiently than any terrorist bomb could hope to accomplish. In attacking New Orleans, Allah attacked our vital oil supplies.

Then, a few weeks later, with hurricane Rita, he attacked those refineries and oil ports that Katrina had left standing. By doing this, Allah has attacked all of America, hitting us at our weakest point - our dependence on energy.

In addition, He made his vengeance known by attacking George's home state of Texas.

The message could not be any clearer. It is time to renounce Christ and admit that Allah is the one true God and Mohammed is his prophet.

Retraction

Of course, I don't believe any of this. I wrote it to illustrate a point. Arguments that target some individual or group as the victim of 'God's wrath' are easy to come by.

Pick any group (Christians, Japanese, homosexuals, red states or blue states, redheads or brunettes, etc.) and wait long enough and you will be able to catch a set of events that will appear to be targeting that group for divine wrath.

If you pick a group that you hate, and you want others to hate them as you do, just wait a while. Sooner or later you will be awarded with a set of events that will allow you to shout, "God hates those who are in that group and will punish anybody who show them tolerance and acceptance."

Examples

We see these types of claims all the time. When Hurricane Katrina hit, some groups claimed that New Orleans was being targeted because of it shows more tolerance of homosexuals than it should. People noted that the hurricane struck just before a ceremony that homosexuals tend to favor. Nobody explained why, if God hates gays, He decided to attack before the party, and not during the party, when he could certainly have inflicted even more damage on His intended victims.

Why did God also take out a lot of innocent people? This is because God was sending a message that He will punish the innocent who choose to live among and accept the wicked targets of His divine hatred. God will not bless us and protect us from harm until we have successfully rid ourselves of these target groups or struck at them with as much hate and contempt as would make Him happy.

Except, maybe God does not hate New Orleans because of homosexuality or abortion. Maybe he hates New Orleans because it gave its electoral votes to George Bush in the 2004 election. This seems to be a much more plausible result. Note that every state struck by this hurricane was a Red state -- a pro-Bush state. Maybe that was the cause of this divine wrath.

Any innocent victims caught in the disaster was God's warning that we should not be tolerating Republicans in our midst. God will not leave us alone unless we get rid of all of them. After all, Hurricane Rita destroyed Trent Lott's house. How much more proof do we need before we admit that God hates Republicans - probably because of false piety?

Maybe God just hates Jazz music. New Orleans has long been known to be the center of Jazz. Maybe he has taken just about as much of that noise as he could tolerate and decided to put an end to it.

Inferences

The argument, "God is punishing us because we let these people live amongst us" can be used against any group. As a result, these arguments tell us more about the people who use them then they do about God. The speaker is saying that God hates this target group, but it is really the speaker that picked the target group, not God. The message is a message about the speaker's hate and intolerance, not God's hate and intolerance.

Hatred of Americans causes one person to interpret the hurricanes as proof that "God hates Americans," while hatred of gays causes another to interpret the hurricanes as proof that "God hates gays." If there were a religion out there with a commandment against playing jazz music, they could argue that this hurricane is proof that God hates those who play jazz music and is punishing the rest of us for tolerating jazz music players amongst us.

What we are actually witnessing when we see this argument at work is a hate-monger plying his trade. He is trying to sell hate and intolerance, and he is using God as a marketing tool to help sell his product.

In addition to using God to sell hate and intolerance, he is also using God to sell fear. He is telling us that if we do not buy into the hate and intolerance he is selling, that God will see that we suffer. It is much like a robber pointing a gun at his victim and saying, "You will purchase protection from me, or you will suffer the consequences." Only, the price of protection is paid, not with cash, but by driving out the target group, be they homosexuals, abortionists, Americans, Republicans, or jazz musicians -- take your pick.

Useful Arguments

Because these arguments can be used against anybody, the conscientious person does not use them.

For example, any group that disapproves of what Republicans are doing should still not suggest that these hurricanes are proof that God is punishing people for supporting Republicans. These people should have the intellectual integrity to restrict their arguments to actual sound criticism of Republican policies, and not drum up phony arguments like 'God's wrath' arguments.

An earthquake in some mountain region that terrorists use is not 'the wrath of God'. It is an earthquake -- a phenomena of nature that does not care about the guilt or innocence of its victims. It will kill a child as easily as it will kill a terrorist or a soldier fighting against the terrorists. These events are not to be used foddor for promoting an agenda of hate. If the target group actually deserves hate (e.g., terrorists), then we do not need to make up arguments to prove it. We have enough proof without these arguments.

A conscientious person would have another problem with these 'God's wrath' arguments. A conscientious person knows that it is wrong to punish somebody for the actions of another. If God is in the habit of killing innocent people to get at those who He thinks deserves to die, then this does not testify to the moral depravity of those who die. This testifies to God's own moral depravity.

Quite simply, "God is punishing people because he hates those in some target group and those who tolerate the target group," is an argument for hate-mongers -- a person who sells hate and uses God in his advertisements. A civilized society has no room for those who peddle midnless hate.

About Me

When I was in high school, I decided that I wanted to leave the world better off than it would have been if I had not existed. This started a quest, through 12 years of college and on to today, to try to discover what a "better" world consists of. I have written a book describing that journey that you can find on my website. In this blog, I will keep track of the issues I have confronted since then.